A commercial Flydubai flight travelling from Dubai to Israel was forced to make an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday after an unusual incident during the flight triggered temporary concerns over a possible hijacking. Israel responded by scrambling fighter jets as the situation unfolded.
According to Israeli media reports citing security officials, the incident may have stemmed from a dispute between the two pilots inside the cockpit. All passengers and crew members were reported to be safe. The aircraft eventually landed at Tabuk in Saudi Arabia, which has both civilian and military aviation facilities.
The Flydubai aircraft issued an emergency signal shortly after taking off from Dubai, according to publicly available flight-tracking data.
The aircraft had been cruising at around 33,000 feet when, approximately two and a half hours after departure, it rapidly descended to about 17,000 feet within a single minute. Flight-tracking website Flightradar24 showed the aircraft subsequently making unusual turns near the Jordanian border before landing in Tabuk roughly an hour later.
A regional official familiar with the incident said there may have been a dispute between the pilots in the cockpit, although the reason for the alleged argument was not immediately known.
Another official confirmed that Israel had dispatched fighter jets because authorities initially feared that the aircraft could have been hijacked. Several Israeli citizens were among those on board. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had recently warned of heightened security threats, although he did not provide specific details. Netanyahu's office later said the situation was under control and that arrangements were being made to bring the Israeli passengers back home.
Passengers on the flight told Israel's Channel 12 by phone that they heard shouting and what appeared to be an argument coming from the front section of the aircraft. They also reported that the plane suddenly descended sharply before landing in Saudi Arabia. According to the passengers, they remained inside the aircraft while a heavy presence of Saudi security forces surrounded the plane.
Flydubai later confirmed that flight FZ1073, which was travelling to Israel's main international airport, Ben Gurion, had experienced a technical or emergency incident and landed safely in Tabuk on Wednesday.
The airline said its team was working with the relevant authorities and that further information would be provided once more confirmed details became available.
Flight-tracking information indicated that the aircraft was a Boeing 737 MAX 8. Flydubai is the low-cost sister airline of Emirates. Commercial air services between the United Arab Emirates and Israel have operated since the two countries normalised relations in 2020.
Incidents involving emergency diversions linked to personal disputes are rare, although there have been similar cases in the past. In 2022, two Air France pilots were suspended after reportedly fighting in the cockpit during a flight from Geneva to Paris. That aircraft did not have to divert and completed its journey to the scheduled destination.
Flydubai operates an all-Boeing 737 fleet. The airline's fleet includes around 100 aircraft, with 69 of them being MAX 8 models. The Boeing 737 is a twin-engine, single-aisle aircraft widely used by airlines around the world.
The flight had departed from Dubai International Airport, one of the busiest airports in the Middle East and the world's largest airport for international passenger traffic. The airport handled a record 95.2 million passengers last year.